This invention relates in general to the construction of sewing machines and in particular to a new and useful device for feeding and sewing a trimming ribbon to a garment part.
A device for sewing a trimming ribbon to an edge of material is disclosed in German Pat. No. 11 20 852 corresponding to U.S. Pat. No. 2,940,406. In this prior art design, the horizontal projection provided on the side edge guide of the presser foot and the horizontal portion of the angle piece on the needle plate hold the upper and lower portions of the trimming ribbon folded to a U-section and the garment edge portion introduced therebetween separated from each other. The guide web and the vertical portion of the angle piece of the needle plate are used to guide the side edges of the upper and lower portions of the ribbon, while an adjustable guide bar is provided to guide the folded edge of the ribbon.
This is intended to prevent particularly wide trimming ribbons folded to a U-section, such as a ribbed knitted strip having a close-mesh and an open-mesh border, from being deformed on the neck or arm cutout of a knitted piece of garment, or on the waist rim of a knitted vest. To a large extent, this device is satisfactory. However, a curling of the outer mesh area adjacent the border cannot be prevented, and the outer meshes cannot be fed to the needle with a sufficient accuracy. To ensure a seizing of the marginal zones, the seam must be sewed at a distance of more than one mesh row from the outer edge, which unfavorably effects the aspect of the sewn area.
Since the open-mesh side edge strongly tends to curling, it was necessary in the manufacture of high quality garments to unite knitted trimming braids having an open-mesh border to the garment piece on straight or circular linking machines by a linking seam securing everyone of the outer meshes of the border. For this purpose, of course, every end mesh of both the upper and lower portions of the U-folded braid and of the garment part has to be engaged on the needles of the needle bar or ring of the machine individually, in a tedious and time consuming manual operation. Only, to be sure, the quality of such a linking seam is excellent, since every mesh is secured and the connection can be noticed only by a person well skilled in the art.